


Southern Wild

by froyobro



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Domestic Fluff, Dont worry the non-con isn't really non con it doesn't make sense just read it youll know, Drunk Shenanigans, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Romance, Stanning Legends only, We Love Love in This House, soft, unaware domestic fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-23
Updated: 2018-10-23
Packaged: 2019-08-06 06:48:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16383341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/froyobro/pseuds/froyobro
Summary: And it was twisted, and it was wrong, but in that moment there was finally a feeling in Steve of something right. Something that settled like the final piece of a puzzle. For one moment he was whole.And for that one moment of peace he had to pay for it."So let me show you my eye sight,we'll be the bell of the southern wild,come show me why at first sight,love moves quickly. Hello nice to meet you,I was wondering if I could walk you home."





	Southern Wild

**Author's Note:**

> Heyy yall it's been a hot minute. Yeah i know I havent updated You Were the One Thing I Got Right in over a year, but yall im gettin back on it!!! A queen whoopin her own depressed ass!!! Anyways listen to Southern Wild it's nice and cute and awesome and calming and it hurts so good. I needed something good and so I wrote this. Love you all and please comment and like cuz i need that motivation and validation !! xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

He could see it in his own eyes. He can’t even convince himself. How is he supposed to convince the love of his life?

How is he going to convince the love of his life that, no, he doesn’t love him, of course not, that’s gay, we’ve been friends for so long, what happened Saturday night was drug-induced exploration, it’s not true, it’s not true, it’s not true, it’s not true.

But it was. And he still felt the tingle of lips on lips. After it first happened, when he told him he had to take a piss (he didn’t have to take a piss), he touched his lips in disbelief. They stung with love and pain and _ **truth**_ and _oh, that’s how it’s supposed to feel,_ not how it felt with that girl in high school, her startling and almost childish pink room reminding him of bubblegum. How he fixated on the walls so he could focus on imagining _him_ sucking him off, not this poor girl who has no clue, who’s trying to prove herself, because he was never good at hiding his feelings and she could tell how close he was to crying, and she tried, and when he came it was like absolution for her, she did that.

But she didn’t. Not really.

And Steve cried when he got home. He didn’t want it. Not from her. And he felt so bad, like he used her, like he had been used.

He still went out with her for another year before she moved from Brooklyn to California.

Steve lost his virginity to her. He did things he wasn’t comfortable with because—because he felt bad, because she was sweet and considerate, because he tried to convince everyone. No one was paying attention enough to see Steve was faking. They were mostly suspicious at how small asthmatic asshole Steve Rogers could land a girl in the first place.

And what surprised Steve was how little Bucky noticed. Bucky, who had been in his back pocket (and Steve in his) for years. At least a dozen years at that time. Buck, who knew his secrets and dreams inside and out, who could communicate with him solely through facial expressions.

Maybe it was because Bucky had his own string of girls to be with, to be his focus. They’d still hung out almost every day, being neighbors in the shitty apartment complex, but it was mostly board games and whining about classes and not being able to afford those cool new flip phones and Buck talking vulgar about his new girl of the month. And Steve would go along, he’d talk about his girl, pretend to act like he wanted to marry her, pretended to be sad when she said she was moving (and he was, but in a way a friend would miss another; another part of it was disgusting and beautiful relief).

Once in a while, however, his friend would be quiet for a moment and say, “You really love her, huh?”

And Steve would pause. Every time, he would pause. Think. Maybe this time he’d come forward.

And he would say, “Yeah, Buck.”

And they’d go back to what they were doing, complain about the new ache of the week.

But now Steve was ready to meet up with the love of his life and he thought about that text again, the one that read, “We need to talk about Saturday night.” And his palms would begin to perspire, his face turn red, his heart speed up. It was like he was in trouble for something, and there was no way to avoid some sort of punishment.

Steve had lied his whole life, and he was tired of it, but he had no choice. Not really. He was sure Bucky was straight, was uninterested, and he was the most important person in Steve’s life following his Ma, and his Ma wasn’t even here anymore, and if he lost Bucky he’d have no one. He’d lose a part of himself.

So, no, he didn’t have a choice.

He straightened his button-down, cleared his throat, willed his eyes to stop stinging, and walked to the train station to meet up with Bucky at their favorite pizza joint in Brooklyn. He would have walked but he would be late. He was cutting it close at it was.

He planned to walk all night after the dinner, try to walk off the pain in his heart as he’d done so many times before. It never worked but he usually exhausted himself enough to at least make him sleep too deeply to think.

On the train, he saw a woman and man holding hands, and he wished he could have that. Be normal. Find someone else, anyone else.

But he already knew no one else would come along like Bucky.

 

Bucky was already sitting down at their second-favorite booth, an unreadable, aloof expression on his face. When he looked up, however, something sparked in his eyes. “Steve,” he muttered.

And suddenly, that night came back in stark focus.

They were sitting around, drinking to get drunk. They reclined one on top of the other on the couch, their friendship too old to care about that “no homo” personal space mentality. (It still made Steve’s heartbeat pick up but he had gotten used to schooling his features and bodily functions enough so as not to arouse suspicion.)

The television wasn’t on, but Bucky’s playlist was crooning in the background as the two men lounged around talking about life, one of their many long, into-the-morning conversations.

“Have you ever thought—“ Bucky hiccupped, “—‘bout the number seven? It’s, like, everywhere.”

Steve hmm’d in consideration. “Seven days.”

“Seven sins,” Bucky added.

“Seven virtues.”

“Seven circles of hell.”

“I can’t think of any more,” Steve muttered, the number seven starting to swim in his brain like alphabet soup. Number soup.

“Do ya think yer goin’ to hell, Stevie?” Bucky’s head was in Steve’s lap, and he stared at him curiously. His eyes were glassy in that way alcohol makes it. There was something sad, willowy in his gaze.

“I hope not,” he snorted, trying to alleviate the tension in the air.

“I think I am.” Buck turned his head into Steve’s stomach. “You have so many muscles here, Steve!” He muffled into his shirt.

(Steve had a growth spurt middle of senior year, got taller and stronger. Still had color blindness, hardly any hearing in one ear, and a nasty case of asthma, but he seemed the peak of health, physically.

He worked out too much, his doctor said. Stretched himself too thin, what he was doing was too strenuous. He got asthma attacks almost twice a week. No one needed to go to the gym one hour in the morning, four after work; six hours on Saturday and four on Sunday.

Bucky helped him—they both took cheap boxing lessons from a friend of a friend of Buck’s dad in the army. Now, Steve only exercised for two hours a day, took Sundays off.)

Steve patted his head noncommittally. “Y’r not so bad y’rself, Buck.” His words were slurring. He took another swig of the bottle of whiskey on the stand next to the couch, then passed it wordlessly to his companion.

Who was actively rubbing his face on Steve’s stomach. “Smells s’good. S’soft, too. Mmm.” He sat up a little to take a swig, then lied back down and scooted around to get comfortable again.

Buck was like a cat around Steve. Wanted his hair pet, wanted Steve’s attention all the time, wanted some sort of bodily contact. The fact that Bucky was like that normally killed Steve inside. What would it be like to be a person Bucky actually _loved,_ romantically? How sweetly would he treat her, how physically affectionate would he be to her?

The images that drunk-Steve thought up made him nauseous, and then, when he replaced the faceless woman with himself, turned him on. It set his heart on fire, imagining all the domestic and the fiery and the passionate and the easy and the difficult moments with Bucky, with Bucky in love with him as much as Steve was in love with Bucky.

He didn’t realize Buck was looking at the range of emotions going on in his face. “Yer thinkin’ of somethin’ deep, Steve-o. Tellmetellmetellme.” He poked Steve in the stomach.

Steve grabbed Bucky’s hand to stop the poking, then turned it so their fingers laced together. “I was thinkin’ ‘bout us in another life.”

“Why can’t it be the life here?”

“I dunno, Buck. Jus’ how it works.” He kept caressing his thumb over Bucky’s soft skin, lightly rubbing at the callus on his knuckle from throwing punches.

“Tell me about it.” Bucky sat up, suddenly filled with more energy than before. It startled Steve, but then he relaxed. Buck was always curious, especially about what Steve was thinking. Always had been.

Steve cleared his throat and looked away. Bucky placed a finger on his cheek and turned his head back towards him. Silently urging him on. He knew Steve rarely divulged of his own accord.

“It w’z you and me in it together. For a real long time, Buck.”

“But…that’s how it is now.”

Steve sighed and closed his eyes. “Not that way, Buck.”

The brunet nudged him with his head, bumping foreheads together. _He’s seriously a fucking cat,_ Steve thought in exasperation.

He opened his eyes and those gorgeous dark brown ones that permeate his dreams and fill his sketch books were so close that he could almost see his own reflection in them.

“The other life is like this,” and Steve did the dumbest thing he had ever done, dumber than fightin’ a bully literally a foot and a half taller than him, dumber than swearing in front of his Ma, dumber than dating that girl for a fucking year.

He leaned forward that inch and he kissed Bucky like it was the first and last time. Because it was.

And it tasted like whiskey and saliva, and Steve opened his mouth and Bucky did the same, and Steve ran his tongue along Bucky’s teeth and soon their mouths sort of melted together, where one ended the other started, lines blurred like the sky at sunset—pinks and oranges and purples and blues sinking into each other.

There they sunk.

And then Bucky slowly brought them back to the surface, separating their lips carefully. Steve leaned forward, chasing, before flinching and throwing himself away from Bucky.

“I gotta take a piss, I’ll be right back.”

 

Now Steve had to slide across from him in the old booth—smelling faintly of bread and the upholstery cracking like lightning, kids picking until some of the sponge spilled out—their second favorite after the one in the back corner where they could hear the kitchen gossip and the baseball radio coverage.

“Hey Buck,” he tried for nonchalance, normalcy.

“I already ordered our usual, so no excuses, no waiting around. Let’s come up front and talk about it for real.”

“What is there to talk about?” Steve swallowed. He could feel his cheeks heat up, his heartrate increase, his chest tightening and his hands sweating.  

Buck said nothing, just glared at him fiercely.  

Steve crossed his arms and looked down at the table. “Look, why don’t we just forget about it and—“

“I can’t do that, Steve!” Bucky near slammed the table before stopping himself, remembering where he was. There were only two other people in the joint, on the other side. They looked like tourists. They minded theirs.

He cleared his throat. “Is that how you feel, Steve? Really truly? About me?”

Steve could feel the pain swelling in his chest, the need to scream _YES YES YES_ , it probably even reflected in his eyes, but despite all that, he replied, “C’mon Buck. Best friends have kissed each other before. S’like a rite of passage. It’s not a big deal.”

Bucky muttered, staring straight into his eyes and conveying a heavy, unnamable emotion, “Well, it is to me.”

And just like that, Steve’s heart stopped in his throat, almost made him choke in that way water makes you choke, and what are you supposed to do when water makes you choke? You gotta drink more water and isn’t that a twisted type of logic.

There was a huge pause, like time stopped, everyone was holding their breath, you could hear and feel your heartbeat in your eyes and ears and toes. Then, quiet as a breeze, eyes downcast, “Me too, Buck.”

“Tell me,” was all he replied, earnest. He grabbed Steve’s hands and clutched them so tight. “Tell me, Stevie. All of it. Tell me.”

And Steve had no choice. He started in third grade, after they had been friends for a few years already, and he realized that sometimes boys like boys and it became a fact of life for Steve. Then, middle school, gettin’ called a fag, and realizing it was bad to be in love with your best friend, and it was the first time he admitted to being in love with his best friend, and it was the first time he swore he would never tell his best friend. And in high school, when he felt like he could do nothing else, when Buck would always ask “You really love her,” how he always wanted to tell the truth—

“I could see it in your face, you know,” Bucky interjected. “I don’t—didn’t—know why you kept seeing her if it looked like it caused you that much pain.”

Steve just shrugged and kept quiet. He still felt immense guilt, queasiness, when he thought about it.

It was quiet, like Bucky was giving Steve time to catch his breath. Then, “I said all of it, Steve.”

So he cleared his throat. How upset he was at Bucky’s string of girls—no, jealous, envious, green as a granny smith apple, like his ma used to say. How good it felt to be close to him both emotionally and physically, how nice it was and how torturous it was that Buck acted like a cat around him, the casual intimacy that killed him every second, how he wished he could be anyone else sometimes. How, when his ma died, Bucky being there meant more than anything else in this universe to him. How he was poor as piss but he didn’t need anything else, “because I had you. And I’d rather die than lose you, Buck.”

His eyes burned and so he looked up at the yellow lights, the dead flies you could see through the film of it. He couldn’t help the tears drop anyways, so he screwed his eyes shut and covered his face with both hands.

He heard Bucky get up.

He was going to leave and never come back and leave Steve alone and and and

Steve’s side of the booth dipped and he instantly felt arms wrap around him, and he let out a sob of relief, turning instantly into Bucky’s shoulder and holding on so tight; he never wanted to let go.

“Let’s go back to your place and I’ll make us a cup of tea.”

If Steve were more put together he’d reply with a sarcastic remark but he only had enough energy to nod, wipe his nose with a napkin from the table, and ask for a box for the pizza they didn’t touch.

Bucky held his hand all the way from the pizza place to his apartment, squeezing intermittently when Steve got too overwhelmed.

“I got you, Stevie,” He said. “I got you. Til the end of the line.”

 

When Steve unlocked the door to his place, Buck ushered him to the couch. “Lie down, I’ll be right back.” He cocooned Steve in his favorite blanket like the mother hen he was, and went to the kitchen. He knew where everything was; basically lived here.

Steve just clutched the blanket close to him, feeling exhausted. He was so anxious this whole day, two panic attacks within hours of each other, he spilled his heart out after years of suppressing the most powerful feelings within him, and he didn’t even know how Bucky felt about it all, not really, only that Bucky wasn’t going anywhere soon. So he exhaled deeply, calming his heart, and burrowed deeper.

Bucky walked back in the living room to Steve passed out, not entirely surprised. S’why he only made one cup of tea for himself.

He got blankets from Steve’s closet and pushed the living room table to the side so he could sleep on the floor next to Steve; he knew that if Steve woke up and didn’t see Bucky, he’d assume the worst. In the morning, Bucky would come forward too—it was only fair. He didn’t want to do it at the pizza place, didn’t want to invalidate Steve’s whole speech, all the feelings he had harbored for years. Steve needed to let it all out, and seeing this weight off his shoulders was more important to focus on than Bucky’s own feelings.

But fuck did he love Steve. Fuck him that he didn’t let himself indulge in the same things Steve didn’t let himself indulge. Fuck him for acting “like a cat,” letting Steve believe he’s like that with everybody, like Buck didn’t cross the line a little because he was so desperate for Steve. Fuck fuck fuck. Steve was his dream, always.  

And fuck, how it hurt so good when Steve admitted he was in love with him. He wanted to yell it right back, scream it, whisper it. All he could do was think it, and at that moment it was enough.

 

Steve stepped on his stomach in the morning.

“FUCK!” Bucky woke up clutching his abs and isn’t that a way to wake up.

“ _SHIT…_ sorry,” Steve rushed to grab Bucky and lift him up so he was sitting on the couch. “I didn’t see you there.”

“I’d hope the fuck not,” Bucky muttered, still rubbing where it smarted.

“Sorry,” he repeated, wincing as if he himself was just stomped on.

Buck grinned ruefully and ruffled Steve’s head like a dog, cuz he got those sad puppy dog eyes.  “I’m just fuckin’ with you.”

“I’ll go make us some eggs,” Steve replied abruptly, eyes widening after Bucky messed with his hair. All the memories from last night came back. Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck—

“I’ll help,” Bucky got up and followed into the kitchen. He took a seat at the counter.

“That doesn’t count as helping.”

“Yes it does.”

“No it doesn’t.”

“Yes it does.”

“Shut up and let me focus on making omelets.”

Steve liked cooking—with baking, you had to be exact, had to pay attention to every little detail. With cooking, you could do whatever the fuck you wanted. And Steve had a way of cooking omelets that made them come out perfectly every time. So he let the motions overtake him and sunk into his thoughts.

It didn’t seem that their relationship was shattered, so that was a good thing. Bucky didn’t flinch away from touch, in fact, still initiated it like he always did. But didn’t he know now that Steve was so affected by it? By the casual touches, domestic bickering, all of it?  

“Stop thinking so hard,” Bucky scolded, “and gimme my omelet.”

Steve turned around and threw an eggshell at him. “Wait your turn.”

Bucky got up and threw the shell in the trash, then went around Steve and grabbed his own egg, smashing it on top of Steve’s head.

“What the fuck, Barnes?” Steve screamed, the yolk sliding down his forehead comically.

His friend could only respond by laughing his ass off. Steve wiped the goo off his face and splattered it on Bucky, glaring so hard Bucky could feel his shirt starting to fizzle.

Before Buck could rebuttle, Steve held his finger up in a momentary act of surrender, took the omelet out of the pan and onto one of Mrs. Rogers’ old and chipped china, and resumed a fighting stance.

“Come at me, pretty boy,” Bucky made a ‘come hither’ gesture with both of his hands and Steve charged like a battering ram. He was pretty easy to antagonize, as Bucky figured out pretty early on.

And that’s how Steve played right into his arms, arms on either side of Bucky and his entire body pressed against him. Bucky immediately wrapped his arms around his torso so Steve couldn’t run away.

“Hi,” Bucky whispered, cold egg goo still falling down his cheek and white shell parts stuck in his hair. His face was only a few inches from the blond’s. “I have something to confess.”

Steve stayed right where he was, on his elbows, staring down at Bucky with wide eyes, mouth opened slightly as if perpetually surprised. 

“I think I’m in love with you too, Steve.”

And it was quiet for a long time. And then Steve let out a long, long breath, eyes closed. When he opened them, it was as if the blue in his eyes became a thousand times more pronounced. “Yeah, Buck?” His eyes watered a little bit.

“Yeah. Yeah, Steve. I’m so fucking in love with you.”

And Steve kissed him again, for the second time in their lives, and it wouldn’t be the last time, and wasn’t that a beautiful thing to know. To know that there would be something there for him, waiting and wanting and loving.

“Til the end of the line.”

**Author's Note:**

> kudos and comments would give me a heart boner <3


End file.
